


All The Little Pieces

by clandestinemeetingsinthetrees



Series: ZK Drabble December 2020 [5]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Cold Feet, F/M, POV Katara (Avatar)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-06
Updated: 2020-12-06
Packaged: 2021-03-09 20:01:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 768
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27911926
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/clandestinemeetingsinthetrees/pseuds/clandestinemeetingsinthetrees
Summary: One the night before her wedding, Katara wonders if she'll ever be truly accepted in the Fire Nation.Written for ZK Drabble December Day 5
Relationships: Katara/Zuko (Avatar)
Series: ZK Drabble December 2020 [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2040542
Kudos: 9
Collections: ZK Drabble December 2020





	All The Little Pieces

Katara stares out the window of palace. Her room is big, bigger than the one she had back when she was just Ambassador Katara and not future-Fire Lady Katara. Was it stupid of her to miss that old room? Sure, it was rather small and far away from Zuko’s quarters, as well as much easier for a possible assassin to enter, but it had been her second home for the past few years. She’d never been a fan of the grandeur and rather preferred her cluttered, modest room that didn’t make her feel like her entire life was about to change.

Was she having second thoughts?

No. It wasn’t that. She’d been here before, spent nights upon nights debating whether this relationship was stronger than all the voices against them. Despite all her attempts to dissuade herself from running into Zuko’s arms, she’d done just that. And she was happy, Spirits she was happier than she’d been in a long time, but also, she was downright terrified.

Terrified of the hateful rhetoric spewing from the New Ozai supporters about her, terrified of the assassin attempts Zuko had received for years and how she too now would be targeted, terrified that her own people would think she has betraying them by marrying into the nation they still openly hate, and mostly terrified that the little girl who was fueled so much by hate for this nation, for the man she was about to marry, would be disappointed in what she’d become.

_How did I end up here?_ She wondered.

She imagined going back in time and telling her fourteen-year-old self all that would happen. _You’re going to find the Avatar, travel the world, become a master waterbender, and… marry the future Firelord._ When she said it like that, it all sounded rather unbelievable.

If only everyone else knew what she knew. All the little things that brought them together, that made them work so well. If only her people would understand that the fire nation and its people aren’t bad, just victims of years of propaganda and nationalism. If they could see how hard Zuko tries every day to correct that. If only his people—her people now—knew how she’d grown to love this country.

It started with little pieces. That small fishing village, Jang Hui, that she still visited to this day when was worried she’d forgotten who she was. _I will never, ever turn my back on people who need me._ And then it was the gardens that her and Zuko would walk through and talk well into the night, the gardens of the Fire Nation are the most beautiful in the world. But mostly it was the people. All the downtrodden who’d been hurt by the Fire Nation just as much as she had, who’d had their mothers and fathers and brothers and sisters taken from them, who’d been forced to fight a war they never asked for.

When she was young, she’d been so angry. She had tried to ignore it, keep herself together for Sokka and eventually Aang too, but it would always boil to the surface. Zuko said she was like a firebender that way. It took her a long time to understand these people she had once fought against. To see past all the hurt the Fire Nation had caused her and empathize with its people.

She wonders how different things would have been if she’d never found herself imprisoned under Ba Sing Se with the person she hated most in the world. That was the first time she ever realized that this war could cause pain on both sides. That even a crown prince could feel the sting of it. If she hadn’t talked to Zuko that night, would she have realized how much that village was hurting? Would she have gone out of her way to help her enemies?

She understands why many in her tribe are against her marriage, she even understands why those in the Fire Nation openly oppose someone of her blood marrying into the royal family, even though she doesn’t agree. All she can do now is hope maybe one day they’ll understand her. She doesn’t need praise, she doesn’t need to be loved by all, accepted will do just fine.

But maybe, just maybe, she’ll grow on them too. Maybe all the little pieces will add up and before they know it, they’ll fall in love with her too.

Pulling herself away from the window, she lays down and lets the gigantic bed engulf her. Tomorrow everything changes, she hopes it’s for the better.


End file.
